In the quiet space, at the docking point of the space capsule connected to the Tiangong-1 core module, the Shenlong aerospace plane has been firmly fixed there. Different from the space where there is no air, the slight sound made during docking can be heard very clearly in Tiangong No. 1, and it was not until this time that Liu Hongliang and Yang Yi had a real sense that they could live, and the two of them were happy to go to the window of the No. 2 real yàn cabin, intending to take a look at the Shenlong, the aerospace plane that they had heard of but had never seen, and had become their own savior at this time. He pressed the communication button and said, "Shenlong, this is Tiangong No. 1, we have found that your left wing may be damaged, please confirm." ”

In the cockpit of the Shenlong, Xia Yu and the others were stunned after receiving Liu Hongliang's communication, everyone hurriedly squeezed to the left window to look back, but they couldn't see that position at all because of the angle, but now they don't have so much spare time to check the situation slowly, and the Shenlong must hurry up to take Tiangong No. 1 away from the current area, so Xia Yu hurriedly ordered Du Junbao and Wu Min to enter Tiangong No. 1 through the interface, and go to the No. 2 real yàn cabin to see the situation of the Shenlong's wings, And himself, Wang Pengyu and Wu Degao began to prepare to check the ignition of the main rocket thruster.

"I'm cǎo!" Du Junbao and Wu Min, who were taken to the No. 2 real yàn cabin by Liu Hongliang and others, just looked at the Shenlong from the window, and couldn't help but burst into a foul language, and then Du Junbao hurriedly contacted the Shenlong and said: "I saw that the left wing of the Shenlong was missing a large piece in the No. 2 real yàn cabin, and the entire leading edge was knocked off by at least one-third, and the current Shenlong can't break through the atmosphere at all, how can we go back?" ”

Broken airframe? Wang Pengyu and Wu Degao glanced at each other, they only knew that they had lost consciousness for a short time during the acceleration process, and when they regained consciousness, they began to busily solve the problem, and they did not know that the attitude deviation of the Shenlong was caused by the impact. Although they considered this possibility for a while, the subsequent self-inspection of the Shenlong was only a failure of the hydraulic and gas thrusters of the left wing, so the two did not expect that the Shenlong would be damaged, let alone that the problem would be so serious.

Xia Yu already knew that it was already in his heart, but the current situation was that Tiangong-1 had to be moved as soon as possible, as for the problem of returning to the atmosphere, Xia Yu had long known that it was impossible for the time being, so he could only wait for the ground to re-launch the rocket to transport the return capsule to Tiangong-1 and then send everyone back, anyway, there was no way to be in a hurry, and the situation at that time was relatively urgent, so Xia Yu never had the opportunity to say the specific situation. Fortunately, Tiangong-1 has entered the stage of long-term manned operation, and there is at least three months' worth of food and water, but there is no concern about survival.

"Don't worry about it for the time being, let's still prepare to move Tiangong No. 1 as much as possible." Xia Yu said: "We don't have much time to waste. ”

"Understood." Although they were somewhat shocked that they could not return to Earth, Wang Pengyu and Wu Degao quickly entered the working state and began to check the ignition of the rocket thrusters.

Although the Shenlong has successfully docked with Tiangong-1, it is not an easy time, and it is not an easy job to use the Shenlong to move Tiangong-1, the instantaneous thrust is too large and the docking is likely to be broken, and if the thrust is too small, it may not be too late to avoid the space debris that will arrive in 12 minutes, for Xia Yu and the three of them, they must be extremely careful.

And after docking, in order to reach the predetermined mobile position, Liu Hongliang and Yang Yi had to carefully adjust their posture and direction with the gas thruster of Tiangong No. 1, which took two minutes to prepare, but their work came to an end for the time being, and now it was up to Xia Yu and them.

"Space debris is expected to reach the current area in 10 minutes, and the main rocket is ready for ignition." Wang Pengyu said.

"Minimum thrust, preparation for the ignition of the main rocket." Xia Yu gave the order: "Ignition countdown begins, 3, 2, 1, ignition."

"Ignition." Wang Pengyu followed, and then pressed the button of the rocket ignition at the same time as Xia Yu, and immediately, the tail nozzle of the Shenlong began to spew out a small flame.

With a total mass of more than 60 tons, Tiangong-1, with the smallest thrust, after the ignition was successful, whether it was the crew of the Shenlong, or Liu Hongliang and Yang Yi, who had been staying in Tiangong-1, they didn't feel anything at all, but Tiangong-1 did start to move extremely slowly under the impetus of the Shenlong.

"Tiangong-1 is moving, the speed is 0.5 meters per second, and the thruster is turned off after accelerating to 1.5 meters per second." Xia Yu said.

There is no drag in space, so when making short movements, you can accelerate to a certain distance and then turn off the engine to save valuable fuel and let the spacecraft float to its destination.

"Understood, accelerate to 1.5 seconds and turn off the engine." Wang Pengyu repeated Xia Yu's order, and then stared at the speedometer on standby.

Unlike the crazy operation of ground racers, which slams the throttle with all their might, allowing the car to accelerate from 0 to more than 100 kilometers per hour in a matter of seconds, The Shenlong Aerospace Aircraft with Tiangong-1 only takes nearly 4 minutes to accelerate from 0.5 meters per second to 1.5 meters per second, and any control in space can not be too violent, especially for a space station like Tiangong-1, if you want to stop, you can only brake with the gas emitted by the gas thruster in the opposite direction of the main thruster, once the thrust of the main thruster is too large, it is not so easy to stop.

"Speed 1.5 meters per second, turn off the engine." Wang Pengyu, who had been staring at the speedometer, said that after Xia Yu followed the confirmation, he pressed the shutdown switch of the engine, but the problem happened, the thruster did not turn off, but continued to steadily increase the propulsion speed.

"The engine won't turn off!" Wang Pengyu shouted, "Try again." ”

"It's useless!" Xia Yu shouted, turning off the engine twice in a row didn't work, and things were going to get bigger.

"Go to the aft compartment and manually close the combustion chamber!" Xia Yu made an urgent judgment, Wu Degao hurriedly unbuckled his seat belt and floated to the rear cabin, and after a while, Wu Degao floated back again, and said with a very ugly face: "The previous fire burned the rear hatch and was stuck, I have tried all methods, and now I can't get by." ”

When Xia Yu and Wang Pengyu heard this, their faces also became ugly. Although I knew that there would definitely be problems after the Shenlong was injured, I didn't expect it to be so tricky, if it couldn't be ruled out in a short time, the Shenlong would fly all the way to the depths of the universe with Tiangong-1. In this way, even if you are not hit by space debris, the final result will be the same.

"Inform Tiangong-1 of our situation, and let them use gas thrusters to help slow down and buy us time." Xia Yu said quickly: "Contact the command center and ask if there is any other way to stop the Divine Dragon." ”

"Understood." Wang Pengyu nodded, and after quickly telling Tiangong No. 1 about the situation here, he immediately contacted the flight control center on the ground.